


Coronis

by Mirefinwe



Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore, The Sandman (Comics)
Genre: Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-12
Updated: 2020-08-12
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:47:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25856140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mirefinwe/pseuds/Mirefinwe
Summary: Explains why ravens are black, among other things. CW: suicide.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	Coronis

The girl is in her late teens. By the flickering light of an oil lamp, her beauty is plain enough to leave no doubt that in full sun she would shine like an earthly sun herself. She is tall and strong, a goddess of a woman, her unbound hair flowing over her shoulders like honey. She is fair, the daughter of a man who could afford to keep her out of the sun, but beside the skin of her lover her flesh shows up almost as tanned. They lie in each other’s arms, his black hair against her face.

“I’m worried we’ll wake someone up and they’ll tell Father or Grandfather,” she whispers.

“You need not fear, my Coronis. They will sleep until the sun rises.”

She giggles. “I suppose you ought to know…”

Their lips meet. When they part, she is breathless. “I wish you didn’t have to go.”

“My responsibilities are heavy. I will return soon.”

“Tell me again about your castle. I’ve often heard Father talk about the palace at Mycenae, big enough to get lost in, and the carved lions guarding the gates of the citadel. Is it like that?”

“Sometimes it’s much larger, and sometimes it’s much smaller, but yes, you can get lost in it. Some have spent centuries trying to find their way out. And I have guardians too, but mine are living and authorised to shut out anyone I don’t want to see.”

“Will I ever see it?”

“You can visit it, soon, when I have more leisure to attend to you fittingly.”

“What will we do there?”

“Whatever you desire. Reality is mine to shape there. I have a brother whose garden maps out everything that has been or will be, but in my realm lives everything that might have been and is nowhere. If you want to drink wine from grapes grown in the Elysian fields, you shall. If you want to hear the songs of the Sirens and live, you can.”

He rises to his feet, slender as a blade and pale as the moon. In an eye-blink he is no longer naked but swathed in a black cloak, a scarlet stone shining from the brooch that fastens it.

“Sometimes I’m frightened of you,” she says.

He bends to her as she sits huddled on the bed and takes her face in long fingers to kiss her forehead. “My love, I would never hurt you.”

“Not that kind of frightened. You’re so much _more_. I feel unreal beside you.”

“Yet you bring me reality. Do not be afraid.” And with that she is alone in the upper room.

***

It was the year that Alexander died. I had travelled to the temple of Asclepius at Epidaurus for healing. I was young and it was my first time travelling outside my own city; everything was a wonder to me, from the dolphins we saw playing in the wake of our ship to the sacred grove around the sanctuary. It was the height of the season, and the town around the sanctuary was as packed and buzzing as a beehive. The streets were full of faces - other patients seeking food and lodging, locals trying to sell them both and anything else they could think of, grave priests around whom the crowds parted like water -, all faces of strangers, except those of my two slaves.

A week after my arrival, the time came for me to consult the god, fasting and in a state of purity. First I had to bathe in the sea, squinting against the light, letting the waves take my filth and carry it off to where the dolphins played, before dressing in white. My slaves took my old clothes and my shoes and went back to our lodgings, leaving me to the company of my fellow seekers after health, all in white and barefoot like me. The priests led us in procession around the temple, instructing us in the deeds of the god.

The walls of the temple bristled with plaques telling of the cures of grateful past patients; I could read them for myself, but the priests selected some to read out for those who could not. The people in the plaques had lain down to sleep in the inner sanctum, pure as we were, and walked out the next day with whole unblemished limbs and seeing eyes full of wonder. There was no doubting the power of the god whose touch could wash away a birthmark as the sea washed away impurity, the god whose very birth had been a miracle. The priests told us how his divine father had plucked him from his mother’s dead womb as she lay on her already-burning pyre, the flames parting around his immortal repentance, for she had died at his wish. For her there was no second chance, but her child had thrived in the care of Chiron the centaur, who taught him the use of herbs and the knife.

I felt light at head by the time the procession was over. The final stage was to descend into the sanctum, filing through a tunnel into the earth, to where the god’s healing snakes lived. It was dim below, the air potent with incense. I stumbled into a corner and let my mind grow blank.

It seemed to me that I woke in the night, though I could not say why, for all was quiet. I opened my eyes and rolled over to see movement in the sanctum. The god walked among the sleepers. He was as I had seen him in the temple that day, wrought of ivory and gold, presiding gravely-bearded from his throne. Now, clad in white so lustrous that it seemed to shine with its own light, he applied ointment and tied on bandages here, whispered in ears there. Those he had passed lay tranquil; those he had not yet reached sometimes thrashed and gasped.

“So what’s wrong with you, then?” croaked a voice, low and close to my ear. I turned and saw no man or god, only a great black raven, watching with a glinting eye and tilted head. “Yes, it’s me,” it said. “I don’t know what you’re staring at. You going to answer my question?”

“Nightmares,” I said. “I want to sleep quietly at night and not be tormented by horrors every night. You’re one of the nicer things I’ve met in my sleep of late.”

“ _Caark!_ Me a nightmare, indeed! I who have been a poet and a visionary!”

“You don’t look much like a poet to me,” I said with determined logic.

“True,” the raven conceded, “I was in human shape when I lived as Aristeas of Marmora, when I travelled north of the known world and brought back news of the Arimaspians, who have one eye apiece and spend their lives in ceaseless battle with griffins.”

“Wait - Aristeas of Marmora? You’re Apollo’s raven!”

The bird cocked its head in the direction of the god, who still continued his rounds on the other side of the sanctum. “I’m his father’s raven, assuming that’s what you mean. Pleasant lad. I come to help out with some of the patients sometimes, the ones whose ailments need the help the likes of me can give. Beats hanging around the castle all day every day dealing with the master’s moods. I can fix your nightmares, no problem.” With two hops it was on my chest, light, scrabbling, its claws pressing through my chiton. Black against the white linen, it lay down as if I were a chick it was brooding. Warmth of body and soul seeped into me.

“Apollo has moods?” I said drowsily.

“Between you and me,” Aristeas sighed, letting his beak sink onto his chest, “my master - who is _not_ Apollo, though you mortals all make that mistake - has more moods than Zeus has paramours. It’s because of one of his moods that I’m black as night rather than white as a swan.”

“What do you mean?” I ventured to scratch his head; he moved it as if pleased. “Ravens are always black, aren’t they?”

“ _Always_ , no. Now, yes. There’s a story. If you want to see it while I’m curing your nightmares…”

“Please,” I murmured, and I was gone.

***

When he appears in the upper room, between one heartbeat and the next, she runs into his arms and whispers in his ear. His sparely chiselled features break into a tender smile.

“You’re happy?” she asks, the faintest thread of anxiety in her voice.

“I’m delighted.” Sitting beside her on the bed, he kisses her as if taking a draught of spring-water, one hand lightly caressing her belly.

“Father will be angry.”

“He won’t know. I will bring you to the castle before it shows.”

She nods.

“You’re silent. Are you afraid?”

“Mother died in childbirth.”

“You will be safe. The best midwives of all lands will tend you in their dreams.”

“Is it a good place for a child?”

“There could be no better. He will have every kind of fantastic creature at his beck and call, living only to amuse him.”

She leans her head against his shoulder. “Can we go now?”

“No, not quite yet. There are disturbances within my realm. I will leave you a guardian, to protect you and the child until you can come to the castle.”

_The room swirled and rearranged itself before my eyes; my vision blurred and contradictory, I was half-aware of a rustling of dark feathers on my breast as Aristeas rearranged himself._

Coronis emerges into the upper room, holding a lamp. “Korax!” she calls, looking around for something.

“Greetings, my dear.” The voice is low, melodic, attention-commanding.

She half-screams before clasping a hand over her own mouth. She glances at the floor, then at the figure cross-legged on the bed, as if she is unsure which to fear most.

“There’s no need to look so scared,” the intruder purrs. “Most people are thrilled to find me in their bedrooms.”

It is not clear whether the figure is male or female. The jawline is masculinity incarnate; the lips make every mortal woman look unkissable.

“How did you get here?”

“The same way Oneiros does.”

A slight relaxation of the shoulders. “You know him?”

“He’s my brother.”

“Are you - Eros?” She holds up the lamp quizzically. “Or Aphrodite?”

“I am myself. They have nothing that doesn’t come from me.”

“Did he send you? Do you have a message from him?”

“I just wanted to see you. To see what all the fuss was about. Why don’t you come and sit by me?”

Coronis sits. The stranger gazes intently into her eyes. “You’re even more beautiful than I was expecting,” they say.

“Has he talked to you about me?”

“Alas, we are not close. I overheard him talking to our sister. He is aflame for you.”

“I don’t know _why_ ,” she said thoughtfully. “I feel ordinary. Sometimes I worry that he’ll see through whatever he sees in me.”

“That is common in love. You do love him, do you not?”

“With all my heart.” The answer is instant. “When he touches me there’s nothing else in the universe. It’s only the two of us and this bed, and I want it never to end. And he’s so gentle. He touches me as if I were made of rose petals.”

“Very touching.”

“Since you’re family, I’ll tell you a secret. You can’t see it yet, but I’m carrying his child.”

“I congratulate you. Are you going to bear it here?”

“Of course not. He’s going to take me to his castle, but we can’t go yet, because he’s too busy.”

“That’s something of an understatement.”

“What do you mean?”

“My brother’s realm is currently in turmoil. He is at war with a being as old as decay and as strong as time, who wants to take over the Dreaming. If he loses, she will add all the protean power of dreams to her own, and he will be nothing. He still holds his own, as of now, but his victory is far from assured.”

Coronis sits shrunken into herself, cupping her belly. “It doesn’t sound safe.”

“You are perceptive as well as beautiful.”

“But here won’t be safe either, for me, once the child shows.”

“Then we must hope that he wins the war before the child shows.”

“Do you think he will?”

An enigmatic smile. “You’d have to ask our brother Olethros. Military affairs are not my speciality.”

“I’m afraid. It’s all so” - a hopeless gesture - “ _big_. Ancient enemies and wars over dreams. I feel very small. Before he came the biggest thing I worried about how to get better at weaving. When he’s here nothing else is real, but then he goes away…”

“Leaving you surrounded by familiar things that are now unreal?” the visitor asks sympathetically.

Coronis nods. “He did leave me a crow to keep me company though… who I don’t see,” she added, glancing around the room. “He’s usually up here waiting for me.”

“Oh, your avian companion. Before I arrived he was overcome by an uncontrollable surge of the mating instinct and had to depart in search of a female crow. He’ll be back later.”

“He’s very funny. He helps me to pass the time.”

“You must long deeply for Oneiros’ return when he is absent.”

“I suppose so.” She bites her lip. “If only I weren’t so afraid. When he’s not here, even _he_ doesn’t seem real, and I know I can never match up to him.”

“So what _do_ you long for? Everyone has something.”

She looks at the floor.

“You can tell me,” her visitor murmurs, their voice a caressing finger down the spine. “Yearning is my speciality. Is it someone who doesn’t make anything unreal? Someone who belongs to the earth, with skin burned by the homely sun?”

Now Coronis’ eyes are glazed, her face blank, mutely turned towards the other’s.

“The universe won’t fade away when he makes love to you. It will carry on exactly the same as before, because from the universe’s perspective he and you are no more than fly-specks. He won’t offer you worlds. Just a good f***. Isn’t that what you want?”

She nods.

“You’re in luck. He will come here tomorrow, a benighted traveller, and your grandfather will offer him hospitality. Bring him up here when the house is asleep, and your longing will be fulfilled.”

“Thank you,” Coronis murmurs dreamily.

The stranger strokes her cheek with a long pale finger. “My child, you’re welcome; I am only fulfilling my function.” And they are gone.

_Images fought for dominance in my vision, one scene layered on top of another. I strained towards permanence, caught off-balance, nauseated as if the dolphins were still playing around the ship and landing had been only a dream. My head was full of feathers. “Is the raven you?” I asked Aristeas. “No,” he crawked. “I am the third since his time, but I bear his mark.”_

The girl and man tiptoe to the bed, where he picks her up and throws her down and himself on top of her. No time is wasted on endearments. Her moans of pleasure are audible despite her evident attempts to stifle them. When they are done, he rolls clear of her and stretches luxuriously. In the light of the single lamp he is small, wiry, tanned. “So,” he says at last, “how many other travellers have you kindly entertained up here?”

“None,” she says softly. She looks worried.

He laughs. “Come, my dear, you can’t expect me to believe you were a virgin…”

_Caark!_ A blob of white throws back the light: an enormous snow-white bird, magnificent, perched on a three-legged table in the corner. The man regards it nervously. “Is that thing - safe?”

“I hope so.” She does not sound sure.

“Strange kind of pet.” He reaches out to squeeze a breast. “Well, never mind. How about a second bout?”

For a moment she seems about to refuse, but the glazed look has not left her eyes. She draws him towards her.

***

Oneiros stands in a long gallery, the glorious white bird by his side, somehow looking extremely pleased with himself. One of the gallery’s walls is covered by paintings, fine full-length portraits (good enough to be the work of Parrhasius or Zeuxis), six in all. The nearest one is that of a squat woman, entirely naked, as the Spartans sometimes depict their women, though her physique could not be further from that of a toned Spartan girl. Oneiros holds a hooked ring. “My sister,” he says, “I stand in my gallery, and I hold your sigil. Will you speak with me?” His voice is hollow, his face now gaunt rather than elegantly thin. There are violet patches beneath his eyes.

Somehow the women is no longer a painting but present in the gallery. The brother and sister regard each other. Though they have no physical features in common, their kinship is evident; they both have the eyes of wounded creatures.

“Greetings, Oneiros,” she says. It is the voice of one who has forgotten what pleasure feels like, or never knew, of one who sees only pain and would offer condolence, if she did not know there would be no point. “I see you are walking on my path.”

“I have had - news. A few months ago I formed a relationship with a mortal woman. I assigned Korax here to be her companion and guardian while I looked to the affairs of the Dreaming.”

The raven preens at Oneiros’ mention of him.

Oneiros does not seem to want to finish his narration, and his sister is in no hurry; she looks as if the concept of haste is meaningless to her, implying as it does some value in reaching a goal. Both stare at the floor for a minute or two, before Oneiros turns and walks a few feet along the gallery. He moves slowly, hunched like a man in pain. He comes to a halt before the portrait of the androgynous creature who visited Coronis’ room.

“Epithumia is cruel,” he says softly. “Korax tells me that she, who is carrying my child, she whom I love - loved… she has betrayed me.”

“I am sorry for your grief,” his sister says. “I have no power to comfort.”

“I don’t want comfort,” Oneiros snaps, turning away from the wall to face her. “Aponoia, for the sake of our kinship, I ask justice of you. It is a small thing for you to accomplish. I want this slut to suffer as she has made me suffer, when I would have traversed worlds to save her the smallest pain.”

“I can do it,” Aponoia sighs regretfully, “but your own suffering will not be lessened.”

Oneiros does not answer. Perhaps he does not hear her last words; leaning against a fluted column, he has raised his hands to cradle his head.

***

“If I were you,” Aponoia says tenderly to Coronis, “I wouldn’t wait until you can no longer hide the child.”

They are both on the bed. Coronis is lying down, her face pressed into the pillow; she does not speak, but occasionally twitches in response to the words of the companion who sits by her side.

“They’ll throw you out to the wolves and bears. I know you’ve lost all your respect for yourself, but why are you hanging on to hear those who raised you lovingly repudiating you with disgust?” Aponoia pauses to let that sink in before continuing. Coronis seems to sink lower into the coverlet.

The soft voice continues: “It could all have been so different. He would have protected you from all harm. Yes, you would have lost your mortal family, but he would have given you worlds to play with, and you and the child would have known security in his love.”

Coronis makes a noise, something between a sob and a groan.

“The child… Poor thing. It would be better not born as things stand. The life of a bastard is no life worth living, even if you somehow managed to survive and keep it fed in the wild. But you’re no Atalanta. You can’t even weave.”

There is hardly any oil left in the lamp.

“Why did you throw it all away, Coronis? Was it worth it? A few minutes of slaked lust in exchange for the love of one of the immortals? In exchange for your child’s life?”

Coronis rolls onto her back, her eyes closed, and presses her hands to her ears. In this position the protrusion of her belly is dimly visible.

“I know you can still hear me,” Aponoia says. (Coronis shudders.) “Yes, it’s a shame you’ve messed up your life. There’s no way to undo your mistakes, I’m afraid, but there is still a way to get out of the ruin you’ve made.”

Coronis drops her hands and sits up. “Yes,” she murmurs, “a way out.” She scans the floor until she finds a girdle, then stands on the table. Aponoia watches with melancholy satisfaction.

***

Alone in his gallery, Oneiros paces. Occasionally he stops before one of the paintings without seeming to see it. Sometimes he murmurs beneath his breath; once or twice he weeps. No being interrupts him. At last his walking ceases. Leaning against the column again, he remains immobile for so long it seems that a statue has been added to the gallery of paintings. After an eternity, he pulls himself together, visibly preparing to face the world and exert himself, and strides forward.

The world reforms around him. When his raised foot touches solid ground again, he is on a wooded mountain slope. A small group of weeping mourners has gathered around a funeral pyre, just beginning to blossom in ravenous orange, wreathed in grey smoke that almost hides the girl’s slight figure. The mourners part before the man who steps out of thin air. Undoubtedly they will tell their grandchildren this, and how the flames parted around him too, and how when he straightened, cradling something, the only thing of him that could be seen clearly through the smoke was his brooch, and that glowed like the heart of the fire.

_“_ Asclepius was born through a miracle,” the priests will tell those they treat.

***

He is back in the gallery. Korax stalks towards him, vast with pride. “Master,” he croaks, “I have come at your summons.”

“So I see.” On Oneiros’ face, soot and contempt. “I have called you here to receive the due reward for your service.”

The raven bobs his bill coyly.

“But first,” Oneiros continues, “I have a question for you. I required of you to remain with Coronis at all times, to be a consolation and a protection. Did you do this?”

“ _Aaark!_ Of course. I was like her shadow.”

“Truly?” Oneiros’ look is inscrutable, but his gaze cuts like a knife. The bird sags beneath it. “I wonder. Well, what’s done is done. She is dead. You, I see, are glad.”

“My lord, I always rejoice in the punishment of those who betray you-”

“Be silent. Your words - your presence - are a defilement. Because Coronis betrayed her union with me, shall we pile ashes upon ashes by delighting in the loss of her youth and beauty? Your colour offends me.”

Korax cringes. “My lord?”

“You are the colour of innocence. Be coloured according to your nature instead! This shall be your reward.”

In an instant the white feathers blush black. Korax glimpses his own shoulder and, with a disbelieving _crawk_ , contorts himself to better see the change.

“Now,” Oneiros says grimly, “get out of my sight and stay there, if you want to keep your miserable life.”

The raven flies; the dream-lord is alone.

***

“Since then all ravens _have_ been black,” Aristeas remarked, clambering down from my chest. “So you were half right. Note also the prominent and effective nature of my master’s moods.”

“The proof was very clear,” I said, lightheaded. On the other side of the room, Asclepius was bent over a patient. As I watched, he straightened and looked in my direction. It was strange to see in his features, perfected and shining with immortal light, his mother’s oceanic grey eyes joined to his father’s fine bone structure.

“Sleep now,” Aristeas said. “Make an offering to the god after you wake tomorrow. You will have no more nightmares.”

I never have.


End file.
